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KJS officials: Kurdistan press law "the most
progressive in the entire Middle East region."
3.1.2007
By Mohammed A. Salih |
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Erbil, Kurdistan
region (Iraq), January 2, -- After an estimated 10
percent of active journalists in Iraq died in 2006,
the rest are asking themselves what lies ahead for
them in the New Year.
A report released by the Paris-based Reporters
Without Borders (RWB, also known as Reporters sans
Frontieres), on the last day of 2006 described Iraq
as "the world's most dangerous country for the
media." The group said it had called upon Iraqi
President Jalal Talabani to put a stop to "hostile
accidents" against journalists.
The RWB says 64 journalists and media assistants
were killed in Iraq during 2006, "more than twice
the number in the 20-year Vietnam war." Since the
U.S.-led invasion of Iraq in 2003, 139 journalists
have been killed in Iraq, 90 percent of them Iraqis,
RWB says.
The survey says what journalists in Iraq know too
well.
"The security situation in Baghdad and other
insecure parts of the country made journalists
suffer heavily, and be victimised in the worst
possible form in the conflict in 2006," Hamid
Mohammed Ali, member of the administrative council
of the Kurdistan Journalists Syndicate (KJS) told
IPS. The KJF is one of the two press unions in Iraq,
with the Iraqi Journalists Syndicate, that are
recognised by the International Federation of
Journalists.
"Since journalists are doing field work in covering
events, they face serious problems and are regularly
targeted," he added. "The point is that every group
wants to shut the voice of journalists to prevent
the deteriorated situation of Iraq from being shown
worldwide," Afif Sarhan, a Lebanese-Brazilian
journalist working in Baghdad told IPS in an email
interview.
"Today, the word journalist means coming death.
Hundreds of journalists have been targeted,
kidnapped or killed for their stories."
All conflicting parties in Iraq today, from militias
to insurgents to the government and U.S. forces are
blamed for targeting journalists, imprisoning them
or detaining them for interrogation.
But security is not the only problem. The media also
suffers from a legal vacuum caused by the lack of a
law that could regulate journalistic activities.
The harsh press laws of Saddam Hussein's regime were
abolished after his government collapsed, but no law
has been created to fill the gap. As a result, many
complain of confusion over rights, duties and work
limits as journalists.
In the country's northern Kurdistan region,
the KJS has drafted a new press law. Although the
proposed law has been criticised by many journalists
as curbing press freedom, the KJS officials take
pride in calling it "the most progressive press law
in the entire Middle East region."
"The new press law in Kurdistan prohibits the
government from imprisoning journalists, and the
highest punishment for a journalist would be fining
him," said Hamid Mohammed Ali from KJS.
According to the draft law, journalists will not
need government authorisation to publish newspapers,
and only need to be registered with the KJS.
Kurdistan has been spared much of the bloodshed
engulfing other parts of the country, but many
journalists still complain that the KJS has failed
to protect their rights in the face of harsh
treatment by the government.
"I believe if the KJS is there to protect my rights
as a journalist and defend me, then they are almost
non-existent, because they mainly represent
political parties in the region," Rahman Gharib,
correspondent for the prominent Hawlati Weekly
published in Kurdistan told IPS.
He described 2006 as "a bad history in the
relationships between journalists and government in
Kurdistan."
Gharib was once detained for three hours and then
beaten on two occasions by local security forces in
the course of covering mass demonstrations and
strikes that engulfed large parts of Kurdistan in
2006. The demonstrations were held against the
regional government's failure to providing basic
services.
IPS
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